This letter is in response to the letter “Shred plan to close Villeneuve Road” by Bob Russell, St. Albert Gazette, March 7.
In 2008 Villeneuve Airport was considered for commercial traffic pending the closure of the City Centre Airport but required an extension of the runway. In 2012 the airport was considered outside St. Albert’s priority growth area due to a lack of infrastructure. It wasn’t until late 2012 that Villeneuve Airport started working with The Edmonton Airport Authority (EAA) to lengthen the runway. Why did the St. Albert & Area Chamber of Commerce take a lead role in establishing the Villeneuve Airport Regional Task Force to lobby the EAA for two years? I doubt medevac was a major factor. Attracting businesses evicted from the City Centre Airport was probably a little higher priority.
How is it that all the important work you did as chair of the intermunicipal affairs committee between St. Albert and Sturgeon County did not carry forward? The 2009 Transportation Master Plan (TMP) does not recommend east/west Villeneuve Road be twinned. It recommends a twinned realignment from Hogan Road to the northeast city boundary.
Why hasn’t Alberta Health or the Sturgeon Hospital been more vocal if straight-line access is so critical between Sturgeon Hospital and Villeneuve Airport? The improvements at the Villeneuve Airport were about business, not medevac. Your use of the medevac issue supports your cause and pulls at the heartstrings of the readers but has no factual basis. Medevac flights go to the Edmonton International Airport. Villeneuve is one of a list of alternates for medevac flights to EIA, but the patients are still going to an Edmonton Hospital, not St. Albert. I spoke to an air traffic controller at Villeneuve Airport and the medical flights to date have been patient transfers, not emergencies. Not life and death from the oil patch.
The Sturgeon Hospital can’t help critical patients coming in on medevacs. The Sturgeon has the same limited capabilities as regional hospitals in the north. The reason you are being medevaced is because you need the specialty care of the trauma units, cardiac care, neurosurgeons, burn unit, obstetrics, etc., only available at the Royal Alex, Stollery Children’s and U of A hospitals.
According to the 2009 TMP, if Villeneuve Road becomes an arterial route to St. Albert Trail, gridlock will result. (art 2.2 / page 4 / 2009 TMP). There is not enough distance between the intersections of Villeneuve and Giroux on St. Albert Trail to absorb any increase in traffic.
I realize the importance of attracting business to St Albert. It appears that the Chamber of Commerce’s focus and opinion on the final road design is based on business without any consideration for the residents of St. Albert.
I vote for closing Villeneuve Rd. between Ray Gibbon and Hogan Road.
Keith Saul, St Albert
